Two thirds of Russians oppose increase in secondary school study time

Two thirds of Russians (65 percent) have a negative view of the idea ofincreasing the time of children's studying in secondary school from 11 to12 years. 25 percent of Russians take the opposite view of this issue,according to the data of the poll conducted by the Russian Public OpinionResearch Center on August 21-27, 2002 in 83 locations of 33 regions ofRussia among 1,600 people (error rate is 3.8 percent). 10 percent ofrespondents were undecided. Over a half of Russians (55 percent) favor theidea of canceling entry examinations to the higher education institutionsand introducing a single national test, which is passed after finishingschool. Around one third of respondents (30 percent) oppose theintroduction of the single national examination, while 15 percent ofrespondents were undecided. Around a half of Russians (47 percent) believethat children studying in modern Russian schools are overloaded withlearning, while 10 percent think that the load is not sufficient. Accordingto 30 percent of respondents, the study load is normal. .